


when we all fall asleep where do we go

by seasidhe (sidhedcv)



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Billy Hargrove Redemption, Fix-It of Sorts, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-06
Updated: 2019-09-06
Packaged: 2020-10-11 09:29:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20543915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sidhedcv/pseuds/seasidhe
Summary: Everything hurts and Billy doesn’t know exactly why. It’s not entirely truth, of course: he knows what happened and he remembers what should’ve been the last moment of his life - impaled by the monster’s tentacles, obviously not the way he thought he would’ve die. His father hitting him and getting carried away? Possibly. Going too fast with his car and crashing against something? Possibly. A fucking monster killing him after weeks of him living in a fucking nightmare? Fuck no.He knows how he died. Except he’s not dead and he doesn’t know what’s happening to his body. He’s not entirely sure he wants to know.





	when we all fall asleep where do we go

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my first language and I don't have a beta so I guess sorry for any possible mistakes?

When Billy wakes up, he’s surrounded by light.

And it’s strange, really, considering all the memories he has from the past month are completely drenched in black and darkness and shit straight out of a fucking nightmare.

(But it wasn’t a nightmare, was it? Everything that happened was real. Everything Billy did was real. Everything that happened inside his head was real. Everything that he remembers was real - but then, why isn’t he dead? He should be dead.)

Instead, Billy wakes up surrounded by light. There’s light everywhere he looks. Everywhere.

There’s light outside, when he manages to turn his head and look outside the window. There’s light on the other side of the room, where Billy can see a dim lamp always kept on. He doesn’t know who keeps it on, he never sees anyone, but the light remains.

When the light isn’t there, nightmares come back.

He’s always running away, now, in his car or on his feet or any way he can. He always dreams of running away, now. He dreams of running away from the voices and he dreams of running away from the dark - without ever succeeding.

The voices in his head all sound like his father and there’s a dark shadow looming right behind him, so Billy runs as fast as he can, trying to leave behind everything he feels inside. He runs and runs and runs and finally manages to escape.

As long as the light is on.

Someone switches the light on without being in the room and Billy wants to know how.

The lamp is a normal lamp, that much he knows. A completely normal lamp. And yet, as soon as he wakes up, the light switches on.

He wants to know how it happens and how the fuck is that even possible - and yet he can’t help but being grateful for it. He doesn’t want to be in the dark. That dim light is the only thing that helps, right now.

He finds food, when he wakes up. He sleeps most of the time because doing anything else hurts too much. But when he wakes up, the light switches on and there’s food right next to his bed and he wants to know how and why but he’s too grateful and too hungry and too tired of his endless nightmares to really care.

He never sees anyone and it reaches a point where he starts thinking there isn’t actually anyone. He never sees anyone so he must be alone. He should be dead but he isn’t dead. He should be in a hospital but he isn’t in a hospital.

Maybe it’s just another nightmare - the start of another dream that’ll soon turns into him running from his father and from the monster under his bed.

He’d like to check if there’s something under his bed, because the feeling of something being there never leaves him, but he can barely move his head. So he doesn’t check and tells himself to stop being such a pussy and stop being afraid.

It doesn’t work. It never did.

Everything hurts and Billy doesn’t know exactly why. It’s not entirely truth, of course: he knows what happened and he remembers what should’ve been the last moment of his life - impaled by the monster’s tentacles, obviously not the way he thought he would’ve die. His father hitting him and getting carried away? Possibly. Going too fast with his car and crashing against something? Possibly. A fucking monster killing him after weeks of him living in a fucking nightmare? Fuck no.

He knows how he died. Except he’s not dead and he doesn’t know what’s happening to his body. He’s not entirely sure he wants to know.

Sometimes he hears voices, when he’s barely awake or barely asleep. He hears a small voice and he thinks she could be Max. He hears the deep voice of a man and he fears he could be his father. Except the male voice is never angry. Except the voice stays outside the door and never comes in - and Billy is quite sure his father would already have thrown him out of the bed.

Both of the voices are outside. Billy is alone.

(And when he’s alone, there are _other_ voices.)

And then, one time, the door opens.

There’s a little girl standing right there, with the most resolute expression Billy has ever seen on a kid. For just a second he thinks she could be Max. Then, he recognizes her.

And when he does, Billy completely freaks out.

“No- no, go away, go away! It wants you, it won’t stop until you’re dead, it’ll make me kill you, you have to go away, you need to go away! Go away!”

“It’s okay. It’s gone. We’re safe,” she talks calmly, like she’s dealing with a wild animal - and Billy can’t really blame her. That’s exactly what he has been lately.

But sure enough Billy still feels like Billy. Billy isn’t trying to kill the kid. He isn’t back in that place, he doesn’t feel broken again - at least not in the same way - and for now he isn’t trying to kill anyone.

“You’re safe. You almost died trying to save me. Now you’re my responsibility.”

Billy doesn’t want to be anyone responsibility - that particular word weights on his body like someone sitting on his chest - but the whole situation is so absurd and his head hurts so much he doesn’t say anything.

The girl leaves and he’s alone again.

When Billy wakes up again, the kid is right next to him.

“Hungry?” she asks, looking straight at him without any fear. She should be afraid - Billy remembers everything, remembers what he tried to do to her, remembers the scared look in her eyes.

Billy wants to run away from her eyes. She looks like she knows everything. She looks like she’s carrying the burden of things Billy can’t even begin to comprehend on her shoulders.

Billy tried to kill her. He remembers, clear as day, and he wants to run away like he always did, like he always does in his dreams. But he can’t. He’s stuck in the bed, somewhere he doesn’t know, with a kid he doesn’t even know how to call. 

She keeps looking at him until Billy closes his eyes and tries to forget.

“You need to eat something.”

It turns out Billy is stuck in a house with a kid he tried to kill and Hawkins’ fucking sheriff. His father would freak out if he knew there’s a pig currently looking after him.

“I’m not hungry,” his voice sounds coarse and his chest hurts so much Billy would really fucking like to cry.

“Yeah, right. Listen, kid,” and Billy would like to yell he’s not a kid anymore and that he doesn’t like to be patronized, but he doesn’t have the strength to do it. “You need to eat. You’re okay, now, but you got it bad and you need your strength back.”

“Why do you care?”

“You’re the reason my kid is still alive. She told me what you did. You fought to save her. I don’t have the habit of leaving people behind.”

The first time the kid is back in the same room, Billy asks what he’s been keeping inside. “Why did you tell him I saved you?”

“Because you did.”

“I also tried to kill you. More than once.”

“It wasn’t you. It was the mind flayer,” she says quietly, shuffling a little closer to Billy and tucking her legs under her body. “You saved me. Now I save you.”

She looks so intent, so convinced of her words that Billy doesn’t know what to answer. Nothing of what’s happening makes sense. Nothing at all.

“I don’t need to be saved,” he settles for this, finally, because it sounds like something the old Billy would say - and there’s nothing he’d love more than go back to his old self.

“It’s okay,” she answers simply, squeezing his hand with the most gentle gesture Billy has ever felt. 

It doesn’t feel okay, nothing feels okay.

But for the slightest moment, Billy can pretend.

He dreams every night, without fault. He dreams about the things he did, the things he saw. He dreams about the monster in his head, about the people he killed and the people he hurt.

And sometimes just the idea of moving feels too much. Lifting his hand seems like something so far away, something so impossible he shouldn’t even think about it.

Sometimes Billy spends hours and hours lying in the bed, thinking about everything that happened in the last few weeks - replaying everything that happened in his mind like a fucking horror movie. He can’t find the strength to move. He can’t find the will to say a single word.

He stays there, lying in the bed, with a long string of bad decisions and horrifying actions playing in his mind and a single, bold question on his lips.

_Am I worse than Neil?_

He doesn’t know exactly when it happens, but sometimes during his convalescence the kid - El - decides they’re friends.

Billy would like to object her choice of friends, would like to tell her she should be as far away from him as possibile, but the truth is that El only listens to what she wants to listen.

Billy kinda admires her for that.

She brings him junk food and books they read together. She brings him music - even if it’s all old stuff and the sheriff has terrible tastes - and she talks to him when Billy feels alone.

The first time he leaves the bed, El is right there with him. (Of course Billy tries to shoo her away but it doesn’t work, and there’s something inside of him that prevents him to be rude to her, let alone aggressive.)

“You can do it,” she murmurs encouraging and Billy believes it for a second. His whole chest hurts like hell and his legs threaten to give out any minute now - and yet he manages to stand up and take a few steps forward.

“Good job, kid,” Hopper nods from the door, clearly satisfied. “You’ll be back on your feet in no time.”

Billy staggers and has to lean on the wall in order to avoid falling down. He’ll be back on his feet in no time. They can’t way to get rid of him, of course. No debt is strong enough to keep someone like him too close.

Billy starts to almost feel like he’s home. Well, not really home. Home would mean moving in silence every time Neil’s there. Home would mean being constantly afraid of the raised voice of his father. 

He’s not afraid, here. He spends most of his time with El and when she’s not there he just reads - he found a stack of books _someone_ left in his room and he’s going trough them all.

It almost feel like his old home. Like when his mum was still alive, when his whole presence wasn’t just an accident waiting for the next beating.

“I’d like to see Max,” he tries to ask, not knowing if they’ll allow him after everything he did and everything that happened. “If I can.”

“Of course you can. She’s been asking about you,” Hopper answers without any hesitation and Billy would like to tell him he shouldn’t be like this. Hopper should be wary, he shouldn’t trust him, he should keep him away from everyone. Billy would like to tell him everything in his mind but he doesn’t even know where to start. Hopper should already know.

“And you’ll let me?”

“I don’t think you’re gonna hurt her.”

“I already did.”

“It wasn’t you. It was the mind flayer. You may not be the best person living in Hawkins but you’re not a murderer.”

“But I-”

“Listen to me, kid. It wasn’t you. I wouldn’t keep you here if I thought you were a bad person. You’re normal, just like everybody else. You’re not inherently good, not inherently bad. You get to decide who you want to be.”

And it’s the first time in his whole life someone tells him this. It’s the first time in his whole life someone believes Billy could be different from his father.

(Billy remembers the look on his own mother’s face every time he raised his voice, like she was afraid he was already turning into Neil. It always seemed like the obvious outcome, him becoming just as bad as Neil.)

It’s the first time Billy begins to imagine a future where he’s notjust as bad as Neil.

When he can walk again, Billy starts feeling like a real person. And then, of course, what he was fearing more than anything else finally comes. Hopper wants to talk to him and Billy can feel the blow coming from afar.

“I was thinking… you’re feeling all right, now, aren’t you? If you want to go home and-”

“Yes. I’ll go home. I’ve been here too much, haven’t I. You’ve done enough. I’ll be out of your feet.”

“You don’t have to go back,” the sheriff blurts out, looking like he’d like to be anywhere else.

“… I don’t have to go back?”

“Not unless you want to.”

And for one moment the whole universe opens before Billy. A whole lot of possibilities, a whole new life far from his father, the chance to be what he _is_ and the chance to be everything he’d like to be. Not a shadow cowering at his father’s fists.

Then, he remembers everything else.

He remembers the reason his father doesn’t take it out on Max or on her mother. He remembers what Neil used to do to his mom. He remembers what he did wrong, everything he did wrong in the last weeks. He doesn’t have the right to be happy. He doesn’t have the right to be hopeful.

“I want to. But thank you for everything you did for me.”

“… If you’re sure, kid.”

“I’m sure.”

“You enjoyed your damn vacation?”

Billy doesn’t answer because he knows that particular voice and he knows that every possible answer is the wrong one.

“Spent all these days lying on the couch, did you? While _normal_ people like me work their asses off. You lazy son of a _bitch_,” and the way he lingers on that last word doesn’t go missing on Billy. Neil doesn’t even look mad, and that’s even worse than usual. He’s just annoyed at him - and so ready to hit him. Billy knows, Billy is just waiting.

“He was hurt! He’s not lazy, he was-”

“Are you talking back to me, Maxine?” Neil’s voice is pure danger and Max looks like she’s definitely gonna talk back. Billy hurt her so many times in the past months. Neil is gonna hurt her even more. So he has to say something.

“It’s not like you do much. Unless getting wasted suddenly means doing something productive,” he drawls feigning boredom, and that earns him a good beating.

What Billy hadn’t considered is that Neil _really _missed his personal punching ball.

Everything hurts once again.

At least it doesn’t hurt as much as what the mind flayer did to him. And that’s saying something.

Billy doesn’t actually know what’s worst, though. The monster inside his head - voice poisoning every good thought he has, while his body hurts from the beatings he’s too scared to fight back - or the mind flayer.

Everything hurts and Billy doesn’t really want to go back home. He has a good experience with Neil’s mood swings and he knows it’s better if he waits at least a few hours.

Billy didn’t want to go home but he sure as hell didn’t mean to fall asleep. He’s in the middle of the forest and he shouldn’t have fall asleep for a variety of reasons, especially not in this place.

Billy wakes up screaming.

He shots up and starts running like he always does, trying to get away from the presence he feels stalking right behind him - getting closer and closer and closer until he won’t be able to escape anymore, until the monster will catch him, until everything will begin once again, until he’ll have to do the things he already did, until-

“Stop!”

One of the kids his sister hangs out with is yelling at him and it takes Billy a while to realize he’s just trying to stop him.

“It’s okay,” the kid whispers, hands up like he’s dealing with a wild animal - and, really, Billy can’t blame him like he couldn’t blame El. “It’s not here. I can’t feel it, it’s gone.”

Billy can just feel a hysterical laugh bubbling on his lips. What the fuck is happening. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re Byers’ little brother, aren’t you? What would you know about it?”

“The mind flayer was in your head, right? I know what it feels like and I can feel if it’s here. It’s not.”

Billy looks back to everything that happened to him - to the horror and the constant terror because of the presence in his mind - and nothing he went through should be a burden on the shoulders of a little kid. Not a single one of those things.

Billy is horrified. He can accept what he sees in the mirror, but seeing the same things in El’s eyes? Seeing the same fear in Will’s eyes? It’s fucked up, really. It shouldn’t have happened to him and it sure as hell shouldn’t have happened to a kid.

“I’m trying to rebuild my castle,” the kid whispers when the silence has become too heavy. Billy doesn’t know what do do, doesn’t know what to say. So he tries not to think too much.

“Do you want some help?”

It becomes something of a regular thing, Billy and Will working on the small wooden hut.

Billy doesn’t ask - because even if a shitton of things aren’t normal anymore, Billy Hargrove still doesn’t ask questions to little kids - but sometimes after the first three or four times it becomes clear that Will hasn’t told any of his friend what’s he doing.

Billy doesn’t ask, because Billy Hargrove doesn’t care, but he starts noticing the way Will looks away every time he’s talking about his friends. The way he talks about what they _used_ to do, how they _used_ to have fun._ Girlfriends ruin everything, _Will says, and Billy has the nagging feeling that there’s so much more behind those words.

Billy doesn’t ask, because Billy Hargrove doesn’t care, but he listens when Will explains how much he miss playing Dungeons & Dragons.

“I could play,” Billy makes the mistake to whisper out loud and Will’s face lights up.

It turns out Will had something particular in mind and Billy doesn’t really have the strength to say no. And so he ends up playing that stupid lame game with Will, Max and El.

It’s not like he ends up having fun, of course, not at all. How could he? It’s a thing exclusively for nerds, losers and little kids and he doesn’t have the time for futile games.

And neither does Gax, his half-orc ranger, who’s busy fighting evil monsters and saving the day.

Billy doesn’t know when the kids become the most important part of his life. He couldn’t protect himself - nobody could, even less so after his mother’s death -, not from Neil, not from the mind flayer, not from the world he has around. And that’s fine.

But he’ll be damned before he lets anything bad happen to the kids. He couldn’t protect himself but he sure as hell can protect them.

So he teaches Max how to throw a punch without hurting herself. He doesn’t tell her if it’s wrong or if it’s right or when to do it, because at this point it’s pretty clear she knows better than him. He teaches El how to do the same, just in case she can’t fight with her abilities, so that she can protect herself.

He teaches Will the best way to be on the receiving end of a bad beating, because Billy has a certain experience in getting hit and he has the awful feeling Will could use it too. Then he teaches him how to throw a punch, too, because you can never be too safe.

He doesn’t know when he starts to think of them as _his_ kids. It just happens, naturally, like everything else.

El, Will and Max. The ones who know too much to be just little kids, the ones that saw too much and felt too much pain. Exactly like Billy was. 

And he certainly doesn't know why the fuck they seem to like being his kids, but he's too tired and too worn out to deny them what they clearly want. The voice in his head - Neil's voice - keeps telling him they shouldn't be anywhere near him and Billy agrees wholeheartedly.

This doesn't stop them from being around him every chance they got. And the more he tries to drive them away, the more they seem to want to stuck with him. Billy learns quickly he can't really deny anything to El. Not really.

Even Hopper knows that - and Hopper, on the other hand, seems to have taken Billy as an unpaid babysitter. Which, you know, fuck that.

When his mind gets filled with screams and blood and horror and fear, Billy goes to his father.

He knows exactly what to say or what to do in order to get hit -he sees in his father’s eyes the same thing he used to see in his own eyes, whenever the mind flayer was in his head.

It’s easier to make everything in his head go away when Neil is beating the living shit out of him. And there’s something inside of him that keeps reminding him that he _deserves_ this, he deserves to be beaten to an inch from his life, to be bloodied and hurt and left crying on the floor.

Billy deserves so much worse than this.

“You can't keep doing that,” Max argues with him any time she can, any time she understands exactly what's happening. "He'll end up killing you.”

Billy doesn’t answer because they both know what he’s thinking: _that’s what I deserve_.

Until one day, Will hits just the right chord.

“You can’t protect us if you’re gone. Who will protect us if you’re gone?”

“El is more than able to protect all of you, better than I could.”

“And who will protect El? She would’ve died if it weren’t for you and you know that.”

And just like that, Billy finds a way to force himself to stay alive. If he’s alive, he can protect them. If he’s alive, he can repent for what he did. If he’s alive, he can try to be someone better.

Joyce and Hopper help too.

They appear to coexist together as one since Joyce told everybody she _doesn’t feel comfortable leaving Hopper alone with his zero survival skills._

(Billy insists on calling her Mrs Byer until she threatens to punch him and then Billy just _has_ to call her Joyce.)

She doesn’t say anything the first time Billy comes to her, bruised and beaten. She doesn’t ask questions, she doesn’t get mad, she doesn’t tell him what he should do or what he shouldn’t do. She doesn’t judge, doesn't yell, doesn’t pity him.

She just patches him up while Will insist on holding Billy’s hand and Jonathan makes tea. Hopper comes around with El, sometime later that night. Even the sheriff doesn’t say anything.

(There are a few times when Hopper tries to do something. Billy can’t handle it. _No one can do anything about it. I'd love to hear what every single man of this fucking town would say about this. A man disciplining his kid? A father kicking the queerness out of his faggot kid? You know what would happen? They would fucking cheer him!_)

When Max arrives, scared and relieved at the same time, Billy breaks down and starts crying. 

It feels like a family.

Will holds his hand and doesn’t let go.

“What the fuck happened?”

“We got into a fight,” Max answers, tone as defiant as ever. Billy would be proud of her if she wasn’t bruised and battered. If Will hadn’t a black eye.

“I fucking got this. What the fuck _happened_?” 

“It's not her fault. Max was trying to protect me. Miller was making fun of me and I tried to stand up to him, like you told me to, but things got... worse. He punched me and then Max tried to help.”

There’s a moment of quiet silence during which Billy tries to decide what to do next. He’s not their father. He can’t in good conscience lecture them for getting in a fight. They would’t listen - and fuck if they should listen to him. So he decides for something else entirely.“Let me see your hands, Max.”

“Why?”

“Just fucking let me see them! See, you should listen to me. I told you, if you need to punch someone you should hit with your bottom knuckles. You didn’t listen to me and look how you ended up. You need to defend yourself, not _hurt_ yourself. Got it?”

“... Got it.”

“Go take some ice, you don't want the bruising to get worse,” Billy nods when he sees Max disappear into the kitchen, and then turns to Will. “What about you?” 

“It's okay. It's just a bruise.”

“What did the little fucker said to you?” 

“It's not important.” 

“Yes it is. Will. You can be honest with me, you know I'm nothing but honest with you. If only, Hopper says I'm a little too honest,” and those last words actually manage to make Will laugh. Even if it’s only temporary, even if the ashamed look comes back right after. Even if Billy can’t do much more.

“He was making fun of me because I'm- I- I don't like girls," Will closes his eyes like he's waiting for Billy to shout at him, to hit him, to do anything to punish him. For once Billy understands it's not about him - it's not that Will's afraid of him, it’s not that Will’s afraid of what Billy could do to him. He'd be afraid of anybody, right now, after what he just said out loud.

And Billy gets him, more than he’d like to, more than he’d ever want to admit. Billy gets him, he gets what it means knowing for sure no one would be on your side, not when there are so many wrong things about you.

Billy is used to feel like that. Will shouldn’t. 

Billy needs to protect him from this like he protects his kids from any physical danger.

“You got a shit life ahead of you, kid. And it’s better if you keep this thing for yourself. But you also have a mother who would die for you, a brother who adores you and a group of friend that love you. And you've got a faggot friend who loves causing trouble and has zero remorse for punching shitty kids.” 

Will gasps softly but doesn't say anything and Billy is really grateful for that. Admitting it out loud is fucking worse than he thought it could ever be. And then again…

“We've both being possessed by a fucking monster. Liking boys can't be much worse than that, can it?”

Somewhere along this crazy ride, Steve Harrington comes back. And it was obvious, really. Billy has his group of kids, Steve has his own other group of kids, all the kids are friends. Billy and Steve find themselves in the same place more than once.

It was obvious and it’s normal and everything else.

It's just that every single time he sees Harrington it’s like a punch in the gut.

Billy babysits his kids and Harrington babysits his kids and their kids are friends so it's obvious they meet sometimes. Harrington seems on edge and Billy can’t really blame him.

Every time there’s a loud noise, Billy sees Harrington’s car crashing right into his car. Every time there’s too much silence, Billy hears the creeping sounds of a presence inside his mind. Every time Hopper raises his voice, even slightly, Billy sees Neil.

There’s no escape. Everything in his life seems designed to make Billy afraid. He’s constantly afraid. When he was scared before he’d act out, make someone else scared. Now he’s just constantly afraid.

So he can’t really judge Harrington if he doesn’t feel safe around him.

Sometimes the kids fight, like it’s bound to happen. Billy knows it’s normal but at the same time the instinct to protect his own kids is too much to fight back.

“Respect and responsibility,” Billy says softly and he can hear the way Max gasps behind the other kids, he can see the way she's frantically looking at him like she's trying to predict what he's gonna do - like she's ready to stand between the copycat of Neil and her friends, like she's ready to defend them from someone just as bad as her stepfather. “Respect and responsibility.”

But Billy can also see how she's still desperately looking at him, like she doesn't believe what she fears is gonna happen. The glint of hope that stands behind those eyes. The last person who looked at him like this was Billy's mother. 

And he knows Max doesn't completely trust him yet. How could she? He knows he still has a long way to go before he can reach that point. But the fact is, _he's willing to try_.

“You need to respect your friends, even though you don't always understand them. And you need to be responsible, because every single one of your friend is your responsibility.”

Billy's willing to work for it.

Billy doesn't know exactly what it is about Steve Harrington that makes everything in his mind go fucking blank. What makes everything in his _gut_ feel like he's on fire, that much he knows. He's not dumb. He's known that boys do the trick for him. He has knows since he was a fucking kid. But there's a key difference between his dick and his mind.

His mind doesn't usually care about other boys - or girls, his mind doesn't usually care about anyone else. He recently cares about three particular kids, one terrifying loving woman and one sheriff, but those are recent developments.

Steve Harrington has rendered his mind useless since day fucking one. And Billy doesn't know what to do about it. 

Not anymore, at least. 

Beating the shit out of Harrington was a viable option when he still hadn't been possessed by a multidimensional monster. Beating the shit out of him was a viable option when he still hadn't decided that he never ever wanted to be like his fucking dad.

Beating the shit out of him is not a viable option anymore and Billy doesn't know what do to.

Unfortunately, the kids decide they know _exactly_ what to do.

Billy figures it out after the second time they - they being Will, El and Max - decide to do everything in their power to leave him alone with Harrington. It doesn’t take a genius, really, they’re anything but subtle and Billy is absolutely going to kill them, when they get back. Well, not kill them. Not really. Scare them out of his private life, that much is sure.

(Like he has a private life. A romantic life. He's good at one thing, and that thing is fucking. Not romance. No one would be interested in this. Especially not another boy. He shouldn't like boys. He shouldn't be thinking about any of this._ I didn't raise a sissy, stop looking at yourself in the mirror like some faggot, stop being such a pussy, what kind of man are you._)

_“_So... wanna get an ice-cream, sometime?”

Apparently Harrington has decided to stop being on hedge and start being friendly with him - and it’s such a fucking bad decision for both of them. They’re sitting on the grass, watching the kids come up with some fucked up plan to do some fucked up thing he still has to understand and Billy just fucking _can’t_ look at Steve.

It’s bad enough when he doesn’t look at him, when he doesn’t look at his stupid handsome face and his stupid good looking hair and his stupid bright smile. “You still selling ice-cream? Haven’t you had enough?”

“How could someone have enough of ice-cream? It's ice-cream, man.”

“… Good point.”

“So it's on. I'll pick you up at five, tomorrow. It's a date,” Harrington smiles and Billy almost chokes on thin air. It's a fucking _what_, now?

“Good job Steve! You did it! Just like Robin told you!”

“See, Billy? I told you he was into you!”

“… You better start fucking running, Max!”


End file.
